Mental health issues can affect anybody at any point in their lives, and celebrities are absolutely no exception. That's why speaking openly about mental health is so important for reducing the stigma, and when famous people especially speak out, it can be really powerful.
And that's exactly what Katy Perry has done in a recent interview, where she opened up about her experiences with depression and her choice to take medication to help her mental health.
Appearing on The Howard Stern Show, Katy explained how she felt that she had "lost" her smile after receiving some negative feedback in response to her 2017 album, Witness.
She said, "I’ve always had a playful thing about my music and I lost that. I had really lost my smile. You create art and you’re excited for it to be received by the world... [And] when it’s not received by the world, when it’s kind of like, 'No, thank you,' you think, 'Oh sh*t, that doesn’t feel good.' It was more than I had ever faced in my life."
The singer went on to open up about her previous experiences with depression, explaining, "I’d had bouts of depression before, but I had been able to avoid falling into the really dark depression by making music.
"It’s like all these things you do to distract: you eat, you work, you get a new boyfriend, you shop."
Everyone's clicking on...
Speaking about taking medication to help deal with her mental health, the 35-year-old revealed that she initially felt "ashamed." She continued, "I was so ashamed about being on medication because I was like: 'I wrote Firework.' But it was one of those things where I’d sprained my brain a little bit."
Katy also said that her fiancé Orlando Bloom, who she's currently expecting a baby with, has been a great help. She explained, "I showed him all of it and he still shows up and he's not phased by it. That's why he's perfect, because I'm a lot."
Katy and Orlando are expecting their first child together, a baby girl, after announcing the good news back in March.
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Emily Gulla was Cosmopolitan UK’s Former Editorial Assistant/Junior Entertainment and Lifestyle Writer, covering celebs, TV and film for the site, magazine and video. She’s interviewed the casts of your favourite TV shows, from Bridgerton to Derry Girls and Stranger Things, as well as dozens of Love Islanders. She also loves getting stuck into long-read features, writing on all things digital culture (including her favourite topic: memes), and dating - having appeared on the radio to discuss dating.
Emily's work has also been published on ELLE, Women's Health, Harper's Bazaar, Digital Spy and more. She holds a First Class degree in English with Film Studies from King's College London, and even wrote her dissertation on Love Island. You can find Emily on Instagram and LinkedIn, and can see more of her work on her website.
